Learning to Share: Measuring Use of a Digitized Collection on Flickr and in the IR

Melanie Schlosser, Brian Stamper

Abstract

There is very little public data on usage of digitized library collections. New methods for promoting and sharing digitized collections are created all the time, but very little investigation has been done on the effect of those efforts on usage of the collections on library websites. This study attempts to measure the effects of reposting a collection on Flickr on use of the collection in a library-run institutional repository. The results are inconclusive, but the paper provides background on the topic and guidance for future efforts.